"Hugo": a homage to cinema reviewed by Film Group

On a dreary winter’s night, the Film Group were greatly cheered by a discussion of the charming 2011 film, “Hugo”, introduced by David.  He first showed us the delightful 2007 book from which the film was derived – “The Making of Hugo Cabret” by Brian Selznick, notably a relative of David O. Selznick, the producer of “Gone with the Wind” and “Rebecca”.  The book is constructed as if the pages are stills from a movie, with black-rimmed edges and many pages of cinematographic illustrations – its first words are ‘Imagine you’re in a darkened theatre’. Both book and film are a homage to moviemaking in general, driven by the film’s director, Martin Scorsese, himself a champion of the history of cinematography. Notably, he has set up three organisations to save and restore films from the past, resurrecting over 800 in the USA and many more globally.  Movies are seen as a ‘source of dreams’. 

The story is of a boy named Hugo (Asa Butterfield, previously in “The Boy with the Striped Pyjamas”, and later as Ender Wiggin in “Ender’s Game”), a fictional character, whose father (Jude Law) is a clockmaker with an interest in automata; indeed, he has rescued one from a museum. When his father dies in a fire at work, Hugo is taken in by his drunken uncle (Ray Winstone), to help with his job of winding up all the clocks in the major Paris railway station at Montparnasse.  The uncle soon disappears (eventually his body turns up in the Seine), and Hugo carries on alone, attempting, with the help of his father’s notebook, to restore the rescued automaton.

Hugo then comes into conflict with an elderly man who runs a toyshop in the station, Georges Méliès (Ben Kingsley). This character was a real person, a filmmaker whose early innovative films fell out of fashion in the 1920s, and who in real life ended up in that very job. Méliès steals Hugo’s notebook but is impressed when Hugo mends a toy clockwork mouse, and gives him a job. Hugo’s other nemesis is the station inspector (a brilliant Sasha Baron-Cohen), whose pursuit of Hugo is aided by a terrifying dog, but hindered by a faulty leg calliper, acquired following a war injury.  Hugo then befriends an older girl, Isabelle (Chlӧe Grace Moretz), who turns out to be Méliès’ goddaughter, and who promises to help him get his notebook back.  She takes Hugo to the Film Academy Library, overseen by a most friendly librarian (a surprising Christopher Lee), where they find a history of film and meet its author, René Tabard, who knows all about Georges Méliès, but imagined him to be dead. Nearly all his films were lost, being melted down for their silver and the celluloid used for shoe heels; he also destroyed his equipment.

Meantime, Hugo progresses with mending the automaton, helped by a heart-shaped key worn by Isabelle, the origin of which is unclear.  When they get it to work, it draws an amazing scene of a rocket hitting the moon, and signs it Georges Méliès – the image is famous from one of his films, and the automaton was indeed owned by Méliès.  With the help of the film historian, they take one of his rescued movies to his house, and project it to his wife Jeanne d’Alcy (the wonderful Helen McCrory, now sadly deceased), who acted in it and in others of his films – in fact, Méliès had two wives, both actresses, but the film skates over this complication. Méliès hears the unmistakable sound of a film projector, and joins them. This leads to his rehabilitation and election to the Film Academy. He takes Hugo into the family, and all ends happily.   

There are delightful subplots – the romance between the station inspector and the flower girl (Emily Mortimer), in which  he claims he’s heard of the artist Christina Rossetti (he clearly hasn’t); a flirtation between a mature couple, hindered by her snappy dog (the wonderful Richard Griffiths and Frances de la Tour); and a subtle brotherly discussion between the station inspector and the child-collector from the orphanage about the latter’s marital difficulties – ‘Are you sure it’s yours?’.

In the station café, there are shots of Django Reinhardt, Salvador Dali and James Joyce, who lived in Paris, and who might have been en route to open the first cinema in Dublin.  Martin Scorsese and Brian Selznick also have Hitchcock-style cameos.

David, a self-confessed film buff, told us that the movie was shot in 3D, using two cameras, and then composited digitally. He also pointed out that there are technical homages to earlier filmmaking throughout, some invented by Méliès himself, such as hand colouring; originally used in “A Trip to the Moon”, this reappears in the scene where Hugo’s father dies in a fire. The mending of the toy mouse uses ‘live stop action’ (think Wallace and Gromit) but done without the modern addition of motion blurring. The shots of Parisian rooftops were done as by Méliès, using models, although with a bit of help from CGI. 

There are also scenes which refer to earlier classic movies, e.g., the scene where Hugo hangs from the hands of a station clock is a tribute to Harold Lloyd. Hugo’s nightmare of a train crashing through the station (a real event at Gare Montparnasse in 1895) refers back to an early Méliès film, which created audience panic as the train approached them.  Charlie Chaplin also makes a brief appearance.

Despite being on many ‘top 10’ lists, winning a number of awards and nominations, and no doubt being much appreciated by film experts, “Hugo” was not a box office success. The group wondered whether this might be because it was unclear whether this was a film for children (it wasn’t), and because it was such a departure from Scorsese’s usual genre of violent thrillers – like Robert de Niro, he grew up in a violent ‘mob’ family.

The group found the film charming, and appreciated David’s expert insights into parts which we would otherwise have missed. Some people wondered whether the boy was a bit bland, or even too perfect – are his eyes really that blue?  We all agreed it was a visual treat, even without 3D, with a gorgeous colour palate of muted browns, contrasted with bright turquoise. We discussed the links between horology, automata and magic – the early Méliès films used magic tricks to create visual effects. We also pondered the factors that might have played a part in Méliès’ films falling out of fashion – clearly World War I, but also the Spanish flu pandemic of 1919, and the appearance of the ‘talkies’.  In addition, although some of Méliès films contained stunts analogous to modern car chases and explosions, they are short on plot, which has become increasingly important in successful films.

The film alluded to everyone having a purpose, and we agreed that Hugo’s was to fix things – not just mice, automata, and the station inspector’s calliper, but also people, notably Méliès himself.

We also noted the strong British influence, not just the stellar turnout of British actors, but the fact that parts of the station were filmed at Nene Valley railway!

The book and film have different endings. In the film, we are led to believe that Isabelle becomes the writer of the story, whereas in the book, Hugo acquires the automaton, who then writes the book (think about it!). For those who want to know more about Scorsese, there is a five-part documentary available on Apple TV.

Our next film, to be presented by Joan on Wednesday, 20^th February, will be “I Swear”, a film about a real-life man with Tourette’s syndrome.